Extensis PhotoGraphics 1.0"Curve Your Text!" |
||
Click on a thumbnail to enlarge it. Use your browser's "BACK" button to return to this review when done. |
||
PhotoGraphics 1.0, from Extensis Corporation, is a new plug-in that puts your favorite illustration tools directly inside Adobe Photoshop by providing a full featured set of drawing tools and advanced text capabilities. With PhotoGraphics you can easily create basic vector shapes that can be filled and stroked, as well as text on a path. Text and graphics created in PhotoGraphics can be edited at any time--even after they have been rasterized in the Photoshop image. Price: $149.95. The program comes in a Windows and a Macintosh version. Extensis has a variety of products: PhotoTools, PhotoFrame, Intellihance,VectorTools, QX-Effects; QX-Tools, PageTools, Preflight Pro, Preflight Designer, BeyondPress, and Portfolio. For information on their products, see our other reviews of Extensis software. We used Extensis PhotoGraphics and Adobe Photoshop for the section headings for this review. Extensis has an excellent Web site were you can get information, examples, and tips on their products: http://www.extensis.com | ||
Advanced Beginners, Intermediate, and Advanced users. This is a great tool for anyone using Photoshop. I would recommend users to have a basic grasp of Photoshop, but it is an easy way for novices to learn to work with drawing tools. | ||
|
||
Interface: The interface is intuitive and has that familiar Photoshop look, feel, keyboard shortcuts, and functionality. The program can be opened directly from the Extensis menu that gets added to the Photoshop Menu bar. The interface was designed to increase productivity and has a no-nonsense work environment that maximizes space for previews and controls. It is very tight and has a minimalist look. All the controls are organized into a Tools palette and four other dockable palettes: Text, Options, Colors and Layers. There are multiple undo/redo options. All active layers can be viewed, making it much easier to incorporate the effect you are creating into the composite image. You can save any PhotoGraphic drawing with the actual Photoshop document you are working on, or save them out to disk as an external file. There is a handy eyedropper to choose exactly the color you want for your effects. Tools Palette: The program provides the user with several drawing tools for creating vector objects and shapes such as rectangles, ellipses, Bezier paths, polygons and starbursts. The inclusion of a starburst tool is handy. All of PhotoGraphics tools can be selected from the Tools palette. And just like in Photoshop, you can select each tool by pressing a single letter on the keyboard. All of the samples created with the program's tools remain vector objects while working in the plug-in, meaning they maintain all of the benefits of a vector program while living in a raster, or pixel, world. They can be reshaped, repositioned, copied, duplicated, grouped, scaled, rotated, etc. More importantly, each object can be filled and stroked according to your needs. Text Palette: In addition to the "extreme editability" (the fact that text created with PhotoGraphics is editable even after it has been rasterized), PhotoGraphics provides you with many formatting options not available in Photoshop including multiple text blocks, character style sheets, individual character color, super-and subscript, all caps, small caps, full justification, and horizontal and vertical scaling. All formatting options, including baseline shift, kerning, tracking, and leading can be set using standard keyboard shortcuts or you can make all formatting choices directly from the Text palette. And it is easy. You just click with the Text tool and start typing exactly where you want the type to be and create as many text blocks as needed for your project. Options Palette: The program bridges the gap between vector and raster programs, providing your favorite vector drawing tools inside a pixel based image editor. Two unique features in particular demonstrate this ingenuity:
Colors Palette: It is easy to apply colors to text and to the stroke and fill of objects in the program. You can name your colors and organize them any way you wish. You can import your existing Photoshop color swatches into PhotoGraphics. Colors created in PhotoGraphics can also be exported so that they can be shared with anyone else in your workgroup. There are two ways to view your colors in the Colors palette. The Swatch View allows you to rearrange the colors in the palette. The List View displays your colors in an alphabetical list. There is also an integrated Web Safe Color Picker which displays Web colors in their RGB and hexadecimal values. Layers Palette: This palette is very similar to the one in Photoshop. You can create, name, hide, view, lock, delete, reorder and adjust the opacity of layers.
Text on a Path: Photoshop users have wanted to be able to create text on a path directly in the program for years. Now you have that ability with PhotoGraphics.
Saving Drawings: You can re-edit your text and drawings at any time--even after they have been rasterized. Text and drawings created with PhotoGraphics can be saved either as an internal file, meaning with the actual Photoshop document you are working on, or as an external file, meaning saving it out to disk. There are extreme advantages to both options.
Applying and Editing: Drawings created with PhotoGraphics and saved internally with the Photoshop document even survive file format changes. In other words, you will still have access, and thus, be able to edit your text and objects even after you have converted the Photoshop document to a TIFF, EPS, JPEG, or PDF file. When you are ready to apply a drawing back to Photoshop, you have a variety of options.
|
||
Extensis PhotoGraphics 1.0 would be an asset to anyone who has yearned for the capability of creating re-editable basic vector shapes and text on a path directly with Photoshop. It is fun and easy to use. I created the section headings using the program by creating a path with the Bezier took and then placing text on the path. If you have not used the Bezier tool before, it takes some practice to use it creatively. And it took me a while to understand the different save options and the consequences. But the program is a welcome addition to the Adobe Photoshop plug-in list. | ||
Processor: Pentium Operating System: Windows 95, 98 or NT 4.0 Hard Disk Space: 3MB Programs: Adobe Photoshop 4.0 and up |
||
Graphics: Extensis PhotoGraphics & Adobe Photoshop |
||